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Todd's Methods, pt. 3: Rock beats with Syncopation

Most drum books present their stuff fully written out verbatim for the drum set, which is fine for learning patterns, but not for thinking like a musician. This is something I made up to introduce the idea of taking a melody line (which could be the melody of the tune, the bass line, or a rhythm part) and making a drum part of it. It’s simple enough that it probably exists elsewhere, though I’ve never seen it.

It’s a good idea to already be able to play at least a few basic rock beats; that will isolate this as a thinking problem rather than a technical one. As always, we’ll be using Ted Reed’s Syncopation: